Offering a unique perspective on transformational leadership based on his combined senior line management, journalistic, and consulting experience. Founder of executive onboarding group PrimeGenesis, author of four books on onboarding and “The New Leader’s Playbook” weekly column on Forbes.com.

Currently spending a couple of days with a couple of my kids in China. Every time I come over here I am struck by the palpable hunger in the air. China is not outgrowing the USA as a nation because its people are any better than the those in the USA. It is outgrowing the USA because its people are hungrier for change. I saw this in Japan in the 1990s. The post-World War II generation had a... Read More

Webster defines transform as to change, and lead as to guide. Thus transformational leadership is about guiding change - as is onboarding. Two-way transformation Transformational leadership is two-way. Leaders transform followers and followers transform leaders at the same time. This is the case in onboarding. New team members transform teams at the same time that they are adapting to... Read More

No one cares about you. What they care about are the results that you and your team deliver. This is why Better Results Faster is such an important pivot point. 100-day Action Plans People that prepare and implement 100-day action plans deliver Better Results Faster than those that do not. It is easy to see why. Preparation breeds confidence. Clarity of message makes it easier for... Read More

A lot of organizations now think about advanced onboarding as giving new employees a list of 15-20 stakeholders for them to have one-on-one sessions with during their first week to learn the lay of the land. Issue The issue with this is that introduce is an active verb. A list is not an introduction. Whether or not those conversations will be productive is a hit or miss thing at best. ... Read More

There's nothing wrong with orientations as part of onboarding per se. There's a lot wrong with orientations as an accommodation tool instead of an assimilation tool. Let's back up. Onboarding is about acquiring, accommodating, assimilation and accelerating new team members. Accommodating is about enabling new team members to do work. Assimilation is about enabling new team members to work... Read More

Just finished Byrne Murphy’s excellent book, “Le Deal” about the startup of ArthurGlen’s designer outlet centers in Europe. It’s a great story about how Byrne and his colleagues learned to dance communication minuets with French politicians, deploy important gestes, survive their many many mistakes and achieve success. One of the pivotal moments in the story is when Byrne learns that it is... Read More